00:11Grazie a tutti.
00:30That was out there on the internet in the wild on its own.
00:33That's awesome.
00:34So let me introduce the panel here.
00:38Directly to my right is game director Todd Pappy.
00:42You were the lead designer on God of War 3.
00:45You are following in the footsteps of David Jaffe and Corey Barlog and Stig.
00:50But your experience is a lot different.
00:51And that really affects how God of War Ascension is going to be.
00:55So next up, Mary Ann Krozek.
00:58So Mary Ann, you're the award-winning writer of the God of War series.
01:03Patrick Murphy, you are the principal character artist.
01:07I want to introduce Mark Simon, the lead designer on God of War Ascension.
01:12First, let's start off with the story of God of War and going through the days.
01:18And let's watch this first.
01:19And even though Kratos sat on the throne as the new God of War,
01:24he was haunted by visions of his family.
01:27But the hands of death could not defeat him.
01:30The sisters of fate could not control him.
01:33And on this day, the man, the legend, Kratos, will have his written.
01:41When you're putting together, when you're concepting God of War and, you know, God of War Ascension coming up,
01:47do you start with like these epic moments?
01:49We totally want to do this and then you string the story around it?
01:52Or how does this all come together?
01:53On 3, we really started talking about set pieces and kind of we knew where we had to start.
02:02And then from there, it was kind of figuring out, okay, well, what kind of set pieces do we want
02:07to do?
02:07And we'd have very, very rough ideas.
02:10And Stig and Marianne started wrapping the story around it.
02:15We throw a shit ton of ideas against the wall and maybe five stick.
02:20Or we start combining other ones to make a big moment.
02:22So Marianne, do you come to this team and say, hey, I was reading the Iliad and this part was
02:28like really badass.
02:29And how does that come together?
02:30Well, on God of War 1, actually, I came in and David had a pretty good framework of what he
02:35wanted the game to be.
02:36And he had an idea of what he wanted the character to have experienced story-wise.
02:41But he didn't have any specifics.
02:42So we kind of started filling in those.
02:43So from my point of view, it was more, it was definitely more about the story than the big moments.
02:48So let's talk about Kratos.
02:50Where did he come from?
02:51What were the early conversations?
02:53David Jaffe's brainchild?
02:55Yeah, yeah.
02:55When I really drilled down on who Kratos is,
02:58because I just tried to figure out as a warrior kind of what's your worst day.
03:02It's a writing exercise where the worst day is when, as a warrior who kills people, he kills his own
03:07people.
03:08So, and then it grew from there.
03:10But why do people like Kratos, do you think, despite him almost against his own will?
03:15For me, the reason he is likable is because we tried to give him a human story.
03:19And I think very much the allegory of one and going forward was sort of this idea of ambition.
03:23It's like, what will you sacrifice to get what you want?
03:25And, you know, you're working with guys that are at the studio 18 hours a day.
03:29And they're really, they're missing time with their family.
03:30And there are things that get sacrificed to make these things great.
03:33And I think that was sort of an overarching theme.
03:35And I think people tune into that, the more human side of him.
03:39Let's see how Kratos evolved, where he came from, and where he is now.
03:42So, this is where it started.
03:45This is a, this is 2002 early Kratos design done by Charlie Wynn.
03:51And I wanted to show this stuff because it's really never been, I mean, I have an archive of tons
03:55of this old art.
03:56But what's cool about it is, it just shows how much work it takes to really create a new IP.
04:01I mean, it took a long time to find him.
04:03And the white ash that covered him in the ashes of his family, that was later.
04:08Early on, Jaffe, Charlie was working on a drawing.
04:11It was black and white.
04:12He was just sketching.
04:13And Dave's like, that's it, that's it.
04:15And Charlie's like, well, I haven't even, I mean, I haven't colored it yet.
04:18I haven't really, he's like, no, no, no, white.
04:19We're doing white.
04:20He's got to be white.
04:21So, then, everybody went back to a room.
04:24And Jaffe and Mary Ann kind of came up with the whole idea of him being covered in the ashes
04:29of his family.
04:30And the blue tattoo as well, like, this is another, I'll show a series of these.
04:34These are also early face concepts, too.
04:36These are ideas, and Dave, I can remember hearing stories about Dave walking around to people's desk with a red
04:41tattoo and a blue tattoo.
04:42It's like, which one?
04:43He would pick one, and he'd walk, he'd walk away to somebody else, and you'd see him going all over
04:47the studio, kind of.
04:48So, blue was, there's actually demos with him with the blue tattoo, you can see here.
04:53But this is early Kratos, and you can see that he was also thinking about the weapon at the same
04:57time.
04:58And that was a huge part of the development of the character, was the weapon.
05:03So, yeah, this is the very first demo for God of War.
05:07I don't know if this is ever going to be seen.
05:09Yeah, this is the prototype.
05:11On a boat.
05:11This is the prototype for the game, the first thing.
05:14But you'll see a lot of the, you know, when they were doing this, they wanted it to feel kind
05:21of high adventure.
05:22And he is on a boat.
05:24He is on a boat.
05:25He always starts on a boat.
05:25There certainly are elements of the game.
05:27As this progresses, you'll see that it's definitely got a war.
05:29You see swimming.
05:32Looks like the dude from Dragon's Lair.
05:35Yes.
05:36I wonder what they were playing.
05:37Yeah.
05:38Yeah.
05:39This is the original final three-quarter concept that Charlie did for God of War 1, where they said, this
05:43is it.
05:44This is the final guy.
05:47In visual continuity, kind of, that became a problem at the beginning of 3, when we could actually finally fully
05:52realize him, high res.
05:54And we started looking at all of the different Kratos's, I mean, God of War 1, God of War 2,
06:00they're all pretty low res.
06:01And then the cinematics one was super high res, but it was a little different.
06:03And trying to figure out, kind of, how to boil it down to figure out what really, what are the
06:09earmarks of the character.
06:11Actually, this is how these rules apply to other IPs.
06:18Finish him.
06:19No!
06:41There's a team of key leads that, you know, review every single thing that kind of goes through.
06:47So, if it has to do with animation, then it goes through Bruno, or one of our key animators, has
06:52to do with combat, then our key combat designers play the game and give feedback.
06:57That's what we did on Soul Calibur.
06:58That's what we did on MK.
07:00It's a small village that helps raise him.
07:03Let's move on to God of War Ascension.
07:06Why did you choose to go back in time and do a prequel?
07:10One word, humanity.
07:12And to basically show the human side of Kratos.
07:17It was one of the things that you never really saw, kind of, in God of War II or God
07:21of War III.
07:24And I felt that there was a question that wasn't answered, which was, how does he break free from Ares?
07:30It's not a job that you just go in and say, oh, I quit.
07:33You know, I'm out.
07:35So, that was something that I wanted to tell, was, how do you undo selling your soul to the devil?
07:41And that's really, kind of, the genesis of the story.
07:46I think at the end of III, Kratos was arguably not a pleasant person to be around, you know?
07:52And I think a lot of, I've talked to a lot of people that are, kind of, they're like, yeah,
07:55I'm playing him.
07:56I like him, but I don't remember why I like him.
07:58So, I think, going back to that, I remember on one, David used to walk around and go, is he
08:03an asshole or is he a tortured soul?
08:05Like, which one is he?
08:06And the answer always, to me, was he's both.
08:09He's an asshole because he's a tortured soul.
08:11And I think we're going to go back to that tortured soul, kind of, why he, kind of, became the
08:15asshole that he became.
08:17So, early on, we looked at everything.
08:19How he runs, how he jumps, how he climbs on walls.
08:22You see some of that stuff in the demo that we have now.
08:25The way he climbs on the walls is different.
08:26The way he fights is different.
08:28And one of the big things that, like, you try to tell somebody and they're just like, yeah, that sounds
08:33cool.
08:34But until you play it, you don't really know what the heck we're talking about.
08:37But this game, we're able, we've got our engine done now, you know?
08:40We don't have to redo the engine.
08:41We don't have to redo a lot of that tech now.
08:43So, we have that luxury where we can look at our design elements and go, man, make it, let's make
08:47it awesome.
08:48So, previous Gods of War games, critical and commercial success is all single player.
08:53So, why multiplayer?
08:56Well, the genesis of the idea came about when we were finishing up God of War 3.
09:04We have a challenge arena where it's Kratos versus Kratos or sole version of him.
09:09And Adam Poole, our lead combat designer in 3, he got Kratos so you could fight against each other.
09:16And that's kind of where it was, oh shit, we can do this.
09:21Who are the big bads in God of War Ascension?
09:24We're about to find out.
09:27In the time before the Titans, before the gods of Olympus, a great battle was waged.
09:35And from this rage, this madness of war, the Furies were brought forth.
09:41The Furies were bound to know, for the Furies sought retribution only for those they deemed guilty.
10:11Bard of War Ascension.
10:22That is Megara.
10:23So, she's one of the three Furies.
10:25You saw silhouettes of the three Furies at the end.
10:30But she would be basically the enforcer.
10:33The whole idea behind her is that she's got these growths coming out of her back.
10:39And she can kind of walk around Doc Ock style.
10:43And she can obviously impale people with that.
10:47But she is a grappler.
10:49She wants to get her hands on you, beat the shit out of you.
10:51Why are they opposing Kratos?
10:54Well, it's again, they hold the bond to his, you know, when you sell your soul, you know,
11:02they hold that bond and they say, okay, you know, you break it.
11:05We're going to drive you insane.
11:07We're going to bring you down kind of thing.
11:09Like a freak show collections agency.
11:11Yes.
11:12So, and that's basically what they do.
11:15They hunt you down.
11:16They drive you mad.
11:17And let's give it up now for Todd, Marianne, Patrick, and Mark, your God of War Ascension leads.
11:23Thank you guys for coming.
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